White Rose
by Crystal heart of ruby love
Summary: Someone had once told him that white represented purity and innocence, something mystical, something special... like the soft petals of a beautiful, white rose... But no matter how white the rose petals were, they could never remain so...


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Author's note:

_Hi there! Well, here's a new one-shot from me. I never really thought that I could produce a one-shot at this point of time, with all my ongoing projects and the yet-to-complete fanfiction: "I will not let you suffer, Kira." But this idea just came to me all of a sudden. I'm still not sure how and why, even until now._

_Well, in any case, read on and I hope you enjoy it._

**White Rose**

White.

He had always liked that color. Someone had once told him that white represented purity and innocence, something mystical, something special... like the snowflakes that fell from the midnight sky.

He agreed to that. There was something unique about that color, so beautiful in an unexplainable way. And everything that surrounded him was white. The tiles of the ceiling, the cemented floor, the soft wall cushioning, the steel bed frame, the sheets... even his clothes. Everything white, everything untainted. He liked it that way. It was perfect.

The ceiling was laid with a regular tessellation of large polystyrene tiles. They were pure white, completely untainted... He would spend long hours, lying on his cold bed, staring up at the white ceiling. Not that there was anything else to do. Counting the ceiling tiles seemed rather interesting. In actual fact, he had counted them so many times that he had the number memorized somewhere in his head, but he always pushed it aside. He was quite good at that. Whenever, he found something he didn't really like, or some faint memory he couldn't decipher arose, he simply pushed it away. He wouldn't let anything hurt his pristine world.

Well, there was no use counting something when you already knew the answer, wasn't it? So he would forget that number whenever he looked at the white ceiling.

Occasionally, he would switch to counting the floor tiles. But he didn't like that, because he had to crawl under the bed frame to count the tiles underneath it. Once, he tried counting the large slabs of padding on the walls too, but he had to keep backing away from the wall and crane his neck so that he could count the cushions closest to the ceiling. He didn't like it. He preferred lying on his bed, where he had full view of the ceiling.

He raised his hand slowly, pointed at the first square tile at the farthest corner of the room and began his counting.

_1, 2, 3... 9._ His voice sounded oddly loud in the otherwise silent white room. There were nine tiles along the length of the ceiling and twelve on the breadth. Automatically, his mind did a mental calculation – there were a hundred and eight tiles on the ceiling. _Each tile was probably... twenty inches by twenty inches_, he mused to himself. _And that would make the length of the room a hundred and eight inches and the breadth two hundred and forty inches._ _That would make the ceiling one thousand and ninety-seven point two eight centimeters square. _

_Interesting_...

He returned his attention to the first tile again and began counting once more.

* * *

White.

He had always liked that color. Someone had once told him that white represented purity and innocence, something mystical, something special... like the soft cottony clouds of an azure blue sky.

The people he saw were always in white. They always came and went from his rooms in groups or pairs, like silent ghosts that drifted in and out. Whenever he grew immensely tired of staring at his tiles, he would stand by the steel door with its soft padding and peer out of the peephole in the door.

The people in white were always murmuring among themselves, but he had once heard one of them comment that he was a smart kid with brilliant intellectual abilities. They said that all the information had come in with his report when he had first stepped into that white room. _Such a pity..._ they all said.

He didn't understand. It wasn't a pity. Why, he was enjoying himself, counting his tiles and living his own world... He loved every minute of it...

They didn't understand him. And it really seemed as if they didn't at all.

At first, he had tried talking to them. There was so much to tell these people. His name, what he liked to do, something about his blonde sister, his best friends... They always listened to him patiently as he chattered on and on. But he knew they weren't really interested in his nonsensical babbling because they never replied him, nor told him anything about themselves. They wouldn't entertain him, so he had to find his own amusement elsewhere.

"_Hello! What's your name?"_

A small, sympathetic shake of the head.

"_You don't have one? Well then, do you want to know mine?"_

A half-hearted shrug.

"_I have a sister. She's blonde, just like you."_

A quiet sigh.

"_I have a green bird. His name is Torii. But I think I lost him somewhere."_

No reaction.

"_I'm sure he's safe. But can you find him for me?"_

The steel door of his room clanged shut.

* * *

White.

He had always liked that color. Someone had once told him that white represented purity and innocence, something mystical, something special... like the feathers on the wings of a descending angel.

He never remembered stepping out of that white, white place, never remembered seeing anything outside those white, white walls. So, he didn't know how he always knew it was time to sleep.

Perhaps, it was when the lights in his room suddenly went out, plunging him in total darkness save for the small slit of light that spilled through the door's peephole. The time when cold fear clasped at his thrumming heart...

Because that was when the nightmares came.

They always came with the dark. Which was why he hated the dark so much. Because with darkness, came the horror and fear that grasped him in their merciless jaws, threatening to snap him in half.

Nightmares filled with the blinding rays of nuclear explosions. A flower made from yellow paper. A beautiful crimson-haired girl engulfed in burning flames. The ice-cold eyes and laughter of a maniac, his face half-covered with a silver mask. An old photograph of a brunette cradling two babies... Streaks of red on his bare hands, blood that he couldn't clean off. He would rub his hands frantically, desperately, until he had rubbed his skin raw and his own blood mingled with that on his hands, burning him like the flames of hell.

He would jerk awake, screaming in his cold hard bed, his hands clutching his skull, his fingers digging into his scalp. The tears slipped down his cheeks from his large, wild eyes, leaving behind blazing trails on his cheeks; his body drenched in cold sweat. He wrapped his arms around his body protectively and just screamed, his curled body rocking to and fro. Until he flung himself from his bed and threw himself against the padded white walls repeatedly. Once, twice, thrice...

It was always then that the people in white would burst through the steel door and swarm into his white room. Someone grasped his right wrist in a vice-like grip while another caught his left arm. He kicked out viciously, spitting venom, lashing out at anyone with his teeth and nails. It was all too white for him; he wanted to stain it all with red, with blood.

Someone heaved him onto the white floor and crushed him against it, pulling his arm back with a painful twist. He could feel the icy coldness against his cheek, but it wasn't as cold as his heart when he felt the white sleeve of his right arm rolled up. He froze almost instantly, ice surging through his stomach. "No... Please..." He whimpered, tears of genuine fear coursing down his cheeks, "Please... Don't..." He attempted to struggle, but the weight on top of him was too much for him to overturn.

There was a hand under his head, mindfully cradling it against the hard floor and a voice was whispering softly in his ear, murmuring endearments. He didn't hear any of it, neither did he notice the hands soothing him, but he did feel the prick of the needle and the pain of it entering his flesh. Within half a minute, his flailing had ceased as the drugs flowed through his blood, draining him of his energy.

He barely felt the weight lift from his back or the gentle arms that picked him up. The white of the walls, the ceilings and the uniform of the people surrounding him had all blended into one. A snowy white blanket of cotton… He was replaced on the bed, and straps were threaded through the bed rungs and over his limp body, binding him to the steel, unforgiving metal frame.

_Why…_ It was all he said. A single, weak murmur that rang out like a gunshot in the otherwise silent room. No one replied him; no one gave him an answer. It was just like always, like every single question he had ever asked them. No one ever responded… They would simply walk away, leaving him bound to the bed, his lips parting and closing repeatedly, his amethyst eyes dazed and glazed over.

_Why… Why… Why…_

_Why are you doing this to me?_

All that white was blinding... overwhelming... He realized that he didn't really like that color so much. Someone had once told him that white represented purity and innocence, something mystical, something special... But he didn't deserve all this white, did he? It didn't suit him at all, because, after all, his hands were stained with red…

* * *

White.

He had always liked that color. Someone had once told him that white represented purity and innocence, something mystical, something special... like the snowdrops that bloomed in early spring.

He liked the white that surrounded him. It was so beautiful. No one could ever hurt him in this paradise, in this heaven. Yet, sometimes… sometimes, it could be so lonely…

At times, he would wake up to find himself in that straitjacket for days, until they deemed it fit to let him go. No one ever told him the reason and he never understood why, but he guessed it must have been because he had been 'bad'. He didn't like it, since it itched against his skin and was always unrelenting. It made his arms ache and without the use of his fingers, he had to keep his eyes trained on the ceiling to count those white tiles.

Still, it didn't matter much to him. He could always lie on the white bed and stare at the white ceiling, counting the large white tiles until he could no longer distinguish between one tile and the next. And he realized that squirming helped to ease the ache a little.

But, he knew everyone would stop coming into his room. The people in white would no longer come see him as often as they did. Occasionally, they would send him dinner, bathe him but they were even more silent than they used to be.

And he knew they would stop _them_ from visiting him. He didn't want that. He liked the nice people who came to see him every now and then. They were his only connection to what lay behind those white, white walls, the only bright colors he ever saw within those white, white rooms.

The instant the guard opened the door, he would prance into the room joyfully, flashing them one of his innocent, sweet smiles and plopping down into one of the white chairs across from them.

They would always smile in response. And he would look deep into their eyes with his excited amethyst ones. There was something special and unique about those eyes – they were whirlpools of complex emotions that he could never understand but he always found what he was looking for. There was always recognition in all three pairs of eyes that watched him steadily. That was enough for him…

Every meeting, every conversation would begin with the familiar cold voice of the guard asking: "Would you like us to keep watch?" To which the man with midnight-blue hair would always reply to the negative. "Alright. You know how to contact us if anything happens, Mr. Zala." The person in white would nod. And to him, he would add, "Behave yourself, Kira."

He would flick an anxious but reassuring smile at the person in white leaving the room. Then he would turn back to his visitors and launch into one of his exciting tales, rambling on in a monologue. They acknowledged him, unlike the people in white. Well, at least the young man with emerald eyes replied him. The two women he always came with would merely sit there, watching him, not saying anything.

"Yesterday," He beamed excitedly at them, "I counted the white tiles on my ceiling! Guess how big my ceiling is?"

A slightly amused smile on the man's lips, but a half-hearted shrug of his shoulders.

"Come on, Athrun! You're no fun!" He would pout, frowning, "Make a guess, please?"

"50?"

"Nope! It's 1097.28 centimeters square! Isn't it fascinating?"

"Sure..."

He sat upright in his chair, smiling giddily at them. He always felt as if there was so much he wanted to say, yet, there was nothing much that he _could_ say. There were always awkward silences whenever they visited him. He didn't understand why. His three visitors usually remained silent, merely watching him until he prompted them to say something, or until one of them felt the need to break the odd silence.

"_So, Kira… How're you here?"_

"_Oh, I'm fine. I like it here. Don't you think it's so perfectly white?"_

The girl with bright amber eyes would always look at him sadly. Those gold orbs would run over his features repeatedly, as though looking for something, but he never could understand what.

"_Do you have friends here, Kira?"_

"_Well, I guess I do. But those people in white never talk to me. And some of the other people in here do nothing but scream or grin at me. But I think it's okay. I like it here. And you'll always come to see me, won't you?"_

The girl with the beautiful pink hair always had that sad, sad smile on her face. He didn't understand why. He had always told her he was happy. She needn't be sad for him. But she would shake her head and glance at the cold white floors, her pink locks covering her face.

"_Are you crying?"_ He would ask her, a tinge of fear in his voice, _"Don't cry, I'm sorry. Did I say something wrong?"_ Once again, she would shake her head, but she wouldn't look at him. He would wring his fingers in his lap, chewing on his lip nervously.

_Had he done something bad again?_

He didn't want to hurt anyone, especially not these nice people… these _friends_ of his… the only people who really talked to him, who really looked at him with recognition…

He had always wanted to hug them when they stood up to leave. But it was against the rules. He wasn't supposed to touch them. The first time he tried, he had gotten pinned down to the floor and drugs injected into his system. The second time, the woman with pink hair had asked to touch him. But the people in white had said it wasn't "advisable" and they didn't want to "trigger off a reaction". He couldn't understand a word they were saying and he didn't understand why he wasn't allowed to touch them.

But it was enough just seeing them come. It was enough for him…

* * *

White.

He had always liked that color. Someone had once told him that white represented purity and innocence, something mystical, something special... like the soft petals of a beautiful, white rose.

Once, when a person in white was bringing his food to him, he had caught a glimpse of a bouquet of white roses she had left sitting outside his door. It mesmerized him and he was drawn to it, his amethyst eyes couldn't leave them.

When she placed the tray by his side and ruffled his hair before turning to leave, he caught her hand in one of his own thin ones.

"_Can I have one of those, please?"_

She stared at him, wide-eyed. The other person in white who was guarding his door turned to look at him with bewildered eyes as well. He waited patiently and hopefully as they exchanged a glance, as though assessing if they would put harm or danger in anyone's way.

"_Well, s-sure…"_

That day, he didn't count the tiles of his ceiling, nor his floor. He spent his time, staring at the white rose he held in his hand, his food left untouched.

The pureness of the white in each petal was exquisite. And as he ran a tender finger over each delicate petal, he felt the silky velvet beneath his fingertip. Such a beautiful rose…

A thorn on the emerald stalk pricked his finger. He didn't feel pain. Instead, he watched, captivated, as a dot of red blossomed on his finger. It slipped down the side of his wounded finger and fell onto the petals of the rose he had left in his lap, staining it red…

He liked the color white. He always had.

But that day, he realized, that no matter how white the rose petals were, they could never remain so. Because it took just a single, tiny drop of blood, to stain a white rose red…

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Author's note:

_Well, what do you think? It's been a really, really long time since I last wrote a one-shot. I hope my work isn't too disappointing. _

_By the way, the "white rose" in this one-shot is supposed to represent peace. In other words, slight bloodshed can result in war and conflict. And it also represents Kira, because war and bloodshed destroyed his innocence. In case it wasn't obvious, the "white place" is supposed to be an asylum and Kira has actually become insane after the first Bloody Valentine War. Well, I know this idea seems rather absurd, but it just came to me like that._

_So I would really like to know what you think about this one-shot? Was it good? Bad? Disappointing? Has my standard dropped? I accept all criticisms too so please, please review!!_


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